Maple Leafs ink Brodie to 4-year, $20M contract
The Toronto Maple Leafs got their defenseman, signing former Calgary Flames blue-liner TJ Brodie to a four-year contract carrying an average annual value of $5 million, the team announced Friday.
The deal includes a no-movement clause in the first year, then a partial no-trade clause in the remaining seasons, Maple Leafs general manager Kyle Dubas told NHL.com's Mike Zeisberger.
Brodie is left-handed but has spent the majority of his career playing the right side with Mark Giordano on Calgary's top pairing. The 30-year-old tallied 19 points in 64 games last season while averaging over 20 minutes per night. He posted strong defensive metrics last season, according to HockeyViz's isolated impact (red is good in the offensive zone, blue is good in the defensive zone):
Morgan Rielly has had a revolving door of defensive partners during his seven seasons in Toronto, but he would conceivably get the first crack at playing with Brodie. Here's how the Leafs' blue line currently projects to look next season:
| LD | RD |
|---|---|
| Morgan Rielly | TJ Brodie |
| Jake Muzzin | Justin Holl |
| Mikko Lehtonen | Travis Dermott |
| Rasmus Sandin |
Dubas has had his eye on Brodie for some time. He nearly acquired the defenseman in a deal last offseason involving Nazem Kadri, but the latter reportedly nixed the swap using his 10-team no-trade list. Kadri was then flipped to the Colorado Avalanche in a deal that brought in Tyson Barrie and Alexander Kerfoot.
The Maple Leafs are now $1.1 million over the salary cap and still have a pair of restricted free agents to re-sign in Ilya Mikheyev and Travis Dermott, per CapFriendly. Teams are allowed to be up to 10% over the cap during the offseason, but the Leafs will eventually have to unload a contract, potentially in the form of Kerfoot or Andreas Johnsson.